What is the conservative narrative about the Occupy Movement? Herman Cain at least is honest enough to admit he hasn’t the facts to back it up when he tells those at Occupy Wall Street to “Get a Job.” He goes on to say the people there, who he assumes are suffering hard times, should only blame themselves. As Talking Points Memo point out, Cain’s opinion is echoed by Erick Erickson of Red State’s “get a job hippies, by Glenn Beck, by Republican strategist Ron Christie, by Tea Partiers here, here and here, and by FauxNews commentators Bill O’Reilly, Kimberley Guilfoyle, and Liz Trotta (she also compared the protestors to the Unabomber).
The central meme here is that those in the Occupy movement are lazy and unproductive members of society who never pay their fair share, but that central narrative in the Republican is false, once again, and evidence that the Republicans and their supporters at the Tea Party and FauxNews are really only after fomenting class warfare, rather than emitting anything like the truth.
How do we know this Republican meme is false, other than that it came from their lips, and therefore tautologically false? A recent poll shows that the highest approval rates for the Occupy Movement are among Americans making $100,000 and above. Yes, those making $100,000 and above approve of the Occupy Movement by bigger percentages than any other income segment, according to a recent poll by Public Policy Polling. Here’s the numbers from DailyKos:
Less than $30,000: 35-27
$30,000 to $50,000: 35-28
$50,000 to $75,000: 34-40
$75,000 to $100,000: 33-35
Over $100,000: 44-31
Declined to Answer: 24-30
The really disgusting news is that ABC News is reporting that the Republicans are softening their views on the Occupy Movement, but you surely couldn’t tell that from Newt Gingrich’s bloviations, also reported by ABC News:
“I think the people who are protesting on Wall Street break into two groups,” Gingrich said. “One is left-wing agitators who would be happy to show up next week on any other topic, and the other is sincere middle-class people who, frankly, are very close to the Tea Party people and actually care.”
“And you can tell which group is which,” Gingrich added. “The people who are decent, responsible citizens pick up after themselves. The people who are just out there as activists trash the place and walk off and are proud of having trashed it. So let’s draw that distinction.”
Ah! More of the “dirty hippie” meme. The real story that will be told in the coming year or so is that the Republicans are alienating their base among high wage earners and among independents by attacking the Occupy Movement. Yes, this is very good news, because Republicans and their supporters are beginning to lose control of their meme. As Micheal Shaw notes, the Occupy Movement Demograhics are hard to identify, but they sure aren’t a bunch of “dirty hippies, at least according to photos. Yeah, and neither were they dirty hippies who occupied Senator Ron Johnson’s offices yesterday, according to Root River Siren.
Hey, how much mileage do you think the Republicans are going to get from cheering the arrest of grandma, or out of alienating people who are well off? Yeah, this is a positive development.
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